American Airlines told its unions Wednesday it plans to cut 13,000 jobs from the staff of 88,000 at the nation's No. 3 airline.
American Airlines' parent is meeting with its unions this week to lay out cost cuts it wants to implement as part of its bankruptcy reorganization -- moves that could cost many of the company's 81,000 workers their jobs and a portion of their pension benefits.
Tough times await most of the 81,000 employees at American Airlines and parent company AMR.
You know that feeling you get when you find a five dollar bill in the ski jacket you haven't worn in a year, or dig a twenty out from between the couch cushions?
Question: I'm retired on a pension and will soon start receiving Social Security. So I'm wondering, once you're retired do you still need an emergency fund of three to six months' worth of living expenses as you did when you were working? --Jim, West Farmington, Ohio
Retirement plans are on the mend, but the healing process is going to be long and painful.
The porous divide between Wall Street and Washington is getting grayer and messier. Look no further than the unfolding tale of Charles Millard, the former head of the U.S. Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation.
Question: I'm 57 and have a defined pension plan at work. At age 62, I can retire with a lump payment of just over $831,000 or I can get a monthly annuity payment of almost $5,400 for the rest of my life. What should I consider in choosing between these two options? --Bob Rozak, Germantown, Maryland
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., which guarantees private pension payments for 44 million Americans, said on Wednesday that it faces a massive, unprecedented deficit.
Question 1. We would really like to get rid of the house, but we don't want to let it go into foreclosure. Someone mentioned a short-sale. If our lender agrees, should we try this? What impact will it have on our credit rating? - Confused in California
You may think that pensions are as dated as the proverbial gold watch. That's understandable. After all, they're arcane and rarely publicized (except to say how they are disappearing), and it's often unclear how much they're really worth. But understanding your pension will help you plan for retirement and value yourself better in the workplace. Here's what you should do.
With the stock market cratering, and once-venerable financial institutions biting the dust, you might be wondering about the safety of your traditional pension plan. I've got some good news and some bad news.
Without a doubt, the past few months have ranked as the most tumultuous - and scariest - times that I've seen in the more than 20 years I've been at Money magazine. We've witnessed events that up to now had been almost unimaginable: the stock market fluctuating wildly and governments around the globe taking extraordinary steps to unlock frozen credit markets. And it's still unclear when the economy and the markets will hit bottom.
1. My wife and I are both retired and we depend on our private pension and other small investments for our income. We are both very concerned and afraid that within the next 6 months there will be nothing left. - Jack
You know how good it feels when you fish a $10 bill out of your jeans pocket right before it hits the wash. Imagine coming into hundreds of dollars from a savings bond or a bank account you forgot about.
The agency that guarantees workers' private-sector pensions is now in better financial shape than it was last year.
My husband is 45 and has worked for the same company for 27 years. He has been given a separation package that requires him to make complicated retirement decisions, the main one being whether he should take his company pension in monthly payments for life or as a lump sum. What should he do? Help!!! - Val, Tonawanda, New York
A group representing retired pilots is asking for a delay in a bankruptcy court hearing into whether the airline can dump its pension plans on a federal agency, saying new legislation may allow the troubled airline to hang onto its retirement plan.
Legislation expected to be voted on in Congress as soon as this week to reform the nation's private pensions could actually increase the burden on the federal pension agency, according to a published report.
General Motors cleared a major hurdle in its efforts to sell its GMAC finance unit as the federal agency that insures pensions said the buyer won't be held responsible for the automaker's obligations to retirees.
From the "no rest for the weary" files comes this mini-dilemma:
The Art of Digging for a Lost Pension
Delta Air Lines will move to terminate its pilot pension plans Monday, attempting to shift responsibility for the future benefits to the federal agency that guarantees such payments.
If you've earned a monthly pension check under your employer's defined-benefit pension plan, the odds are good that you'll get at least some money, even in the worst-case scenario.
The U.S. pension insurer has appealed a bankruptcy court decision allowing Delta Air Lines Inc. to implement a new pilots' contract that includes payments to pilots in case their pension plan is turned over to the agency.
A U.S. bankruptcy court judge approved a deal for a new contract between Delta Air Lines Inc. and its pilots, who had ratified the new contract earlier Wednesday.
Are defined-benefits pension plans sustainable?
Some of the nastiest conflicts in America's future have recently begun to reveal themselves. Let's call them, broadly, the pension wars.
Some of the nastiest conflicts in America's future have recently begun to reveal themselves. Let's call them, broadly, the pension wars. They will be fought on a wide range of battlefields, involvi...
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - Reliable income for life. Most people want it, but fewer and fewer workers can count on it.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - A thumbs-up this week from the United Auto Workers on a revised version of a pension reform bill helped smooth the way for its passage in the House of Representatives on Thursday afternoon.
Social Security reform, bankruptcy reform, tax reform - add pension reform to the mix.
My wife plans to retire in two years at age 48. When she does, she has the choice of taking a $350,000 lump-sum payment or having her company pay her a pension of $1,600 a month for life. What would you advise?
General Motors' pension pain could soon spread to hundreds of other companies, even those offering relatively healthy traditional pension plans.
The federal government contends that General Motors' pension fund is $31 billion short of what it owes its work force and retirees, a figure strongly disputed by the automaker, which argues its plans have $2 billion more than necessary to cover anticipated benefits, according to a published report.
The bankruptcy of Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines could add billions of dollars to the government's already overburdened back-up pension scheme. If your company goes bust, will the emergency fund still be there to pick up the tab?
It has not been the sort of year that makes you breathe easy about retirement. United Airlines got permission from a judge to default on $6.6 billion in pension commitments. The government's Pensio...
If you're one of the 23 million or so people who work for a company with a traditional pension--that is, a plan that gives you a monthly check based on your salary and number of years of service--y...
The captains of American corporate life could learn much about how real leaders treat their troops from the captains and the lieutenants of the United States Marine Corps.
If you're one of the 23 million or so people who work for a company with a traditional pension -- that is, a plan that gives you a monthly check based on your salary and number of years of service -- you may think the main threat to your retirement is your company defaulting on its promise to pay. That's what bankrupt United Airlines did in May.
The federal agency insuring private-sector pension plans that have promised benefits to about 44 million employees and retirees could see its own shortfall more than triple in the next decade, a congressional agency said Thursday.
United Airlines used loopholes in federal pension laws to treat its pension funds as solid for years, when in fact they were dangerously weakening, according to a published report.
Many of the nation's private sector pension plans are seeing a bigger gap between their assets and their promised benefit levels, according to a published report Tuesday.
After reading about the people at United Airlines losing their pensions, I'm beginning to wonder whether my pension is safe. Should people like me who have a corporate pension be concerned about losing our benefits?
FOR THREE BRUTAL YEARS THE TOP BRASS at America's old-guard airlines have been telling anyone who would listen, off the record of course, that a single watershed event is all they need to put their...
As if you don't have enough to worry about with 401(k) and Social Security benefits, here comes a new retirement woe: traditional pension plans may be in the worst shape of all.
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. (PBGC) rang in the new year by announcing that it would take over responsibility for the pilots' pension plan at United Airlines, to the tune of $1.4 billion. The...
IMAGINE, FOR A MOMENT, THE FINANCIAL prospects of an insurance company that charged the same premium to the owner of a mobile home on the hurricane-battered Florida coast as it did to the owner of ...
Shouldn't there have been a shake-out by now?
Traditionally, pensions have been the gold standard of retirement plans. Let's face it, if you have the option of funding your own retirement or having someone else do it for you, you'd take the free ride, right?
Some 35,000 filing cabinets (including the ones at left) containing records of $350 billion in federal employee retirement benefits are literally buried in Boyers, Pa. The facility is officially na...
What do more than 43 million workers have in common with a legendary 79-year-old baseball player? As was the case with Sam "Jet" Jethroe (pictured at right), who broke the Boston Braves' color barr...
QUICK: HOW MUCH MONEY DO YOU HAVE IN your 401(k) or 403(b) retirement plan at work? If you're a serious investor, or simply a worrier, you may be able to answer that question with reasonable accura...
STARTING IN MID-SEPTEMBER, AN ESTImated 4 million employees and retired workers at 1,500 large companies--including Northwest Airlines and Westinghouse--will get an unsettling letter from their emp...
BY NOW, you must have heard that there is another crisis brewing of savings and loan-like proportions, this one in the nation's private pension system. Thousands of corporate plans do not have enou...
The Retirement Protection Act of 1993, which the Clinton Administration sent to Congress last year, would require employers to notify their employees if a pension plan is underfunded. But Congress ...
What will it be? St. Thomas in January with daiquiris at the 19th hole and a pile of dividend checks waiting for you back home? Or a part-time job at the local mall, macaroni four nights out of sev...
WHEN Gerald Parker started working at Republic Steel 25 years ago, he expected to do the industry's standard ''30 years and out,'' with a generous pension at the end of his three decades of toil. '...
Forty years ago, only 9.8 million employees -- a quarter of all Americans working for private companies -- were covered by pension plans. That figure has grown to 42 million today, or almost half o...
NOTHING is safe anymore,'' says William Seidman, who ought to know. He recently resigned as head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. after six years of trying to shore up the U.S. banking system...
Add the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. to the list of federal agencies that may cost taxpayers a bundle. Spawned in 1974, PBGC acts as the backer of last resort for 95,000 private pension plans cov...
Here's a safe assumption: your company doesn't offer a retirement plan -- either for you or your employees. How do we know? It's easy: scared off by high administrative costs and complex regulation...
Millions of working Americans may have a fresh reason to worry about the looming recession: its effects on their pensions. No fewer than 50 large U.S. companies -- including General Motors, RJR Nab...
TAXES Q. I plan to buy a horse within the next year. If I ride my horse twice a week and lease it to a riding academy the rest of the time, can I write off some of the cost of stabling the horse at...
The specter of a corporate restructuring or takeover where you work may leave you feeling decidedly insecure not only about your job but also about your retirement benefits. Your jitters are justif...
''What you are seeing now is the development of enormous power without many effective limits.'' -- David Boies, lead attorney for Texaco, talking about pension funds.
One misguided view of the 1987 stock market crash is that outside of the securities industry and its well-heeled clients, the disaster deserved about as much interest as a showdown for last place i...
The way I park my cash, The way I buy tax-free, The hedges for my stash: No, no, they can't take wealth away from me.
WHEN LTV STEEL recently handed over unfunded pension obligations of $236 million to the federal government's Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), regulators and retirees shuddered, but pens...
The market is up -- and, as sure as the grunion run in California, companies are finding gold in their pension funds. Soaring prices for stocks and bonds have enriched most funds far beyond their p...
THE PENSION Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the federal agency that stands behind the nation's corporate pension plans, suddenly needs a better safety net itself. In recent years the PBGC's resources...
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